


Mob Ties

by dragonspell



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M, Non-Consensual Touching, Past Relationship(s), Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-22
Updated: 2017-01-22
Packaged: 2018-09-19 07:28:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9425876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonspell/pseuds/dragonspell
Summary: Fuck, Leonard thinks.Well, that was stupid.He’d like to blame Stodge, who didn’t seem to understand that part of being the lookout meant issuing an actual warning instead of just taking off, or Klein the thick-fingered and clumsy, but Leonard knows that it’s really on him.  He’s the one who had planned the heist and he really should have looked deeper into the paperwork.  Corporate structures aren’t his thing, but sometimes you have to pay attention to the fine print. “Leonard Snart,” Giovanni Rossi says, his voice curling around Leonard’s name like a lover’s caress.  “Care to tell me what you were doing in my vault?”Leonard shrugs casually and looks away, pretending that he’s interested in Rossi’s décor.  “I was in the area,” he says.  “Thought I’d stop by.”(Or, before the events of The Flash, Leonard attempts a job and gets caught  by the owner.  They have a chat.  Past Coldwave.  Some non-consensual touching.)





	

_Fuck_ , Leonard thinks. _Well, that was stupid._

He’d like to blame Stodge, who didn’t seem to understand that part of being the lookout meant issuing an actual warning instead of just taking off, or Klein the thick-fingered and clumsy, but Leonard knows that it’s really on him. He’s the one who had planned the heist and he really should have looked deeper into the paperwork. Corporate structures aren’t his thing, but sometimes you have to pay attention to the fine print.

If Leonard had bothered looking into it a little more, he might have figured out that Zalany Corp. is only a shell company. He doubts that the president, Bob Price, even exists or, if he does, he’s a shady corporate lawyer or possibly a damn intern. If Leonard had spent more time examining the history and less time thinking of how clever he was, then he would have known that the sapphires—the “Tears of the Water Dragon”—were not owned by a newly rich, previous unheard of corporate executive, but rather by Giovanni Colombo Rossi and Leonard would not be currently being dragged into a well-known mobster’s house. His father had worked with the mob. Look where it had gotten him. Leonard had always sworn that he’d do better.

He’d done better alright. He’d tried to _steal_ from the mob and had gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Or, you know, the five million dollar vault hiding below a Central City high rise.

And Rossi. Fucking _Rossi_. If Leonard’s father ever finds out, he’s going to laugh his ass off.

The goons on either side of him drag him through a marbled foyer, past a hallway more Italian paintings than wall and into a room that’s lined with bookshelves and containing precisely one Giovanni Rossi and what looks to be one of Rossi’s more idiotic offspring, the thick-headed Giorgio Rossi. Leonard’s night just keeps getting better and better all the time. The goons slam Leonard into a sturdy wooden chair and hold him down while they buckle him in for safety. As the cuffs snap around Leonard’s wrists, Leonard meets Giorgio’s eyes and stares him down. Giorgio isn’t nearly as dangerous as his father, too stupid to inflict much damage, but he’s still a bull, liable to charge at a moment’s notice. 

Leaning against his daddy’s expensive desk, Giorgio smirks and lets his gaze travel down Leonard’s body and back up again. It’s a family trait, Leonard’s found. Leonard forces his features into a bored expression, wrapping up the anger that’s wanting to boil over inside of him. He refuses to give little Giorgio anything. Leonard was out robbing banks when Giorgio was still in diapers, drooling on his father’s designer suits.

“Leonard Snart,” Giovanni Rossi says, his voice curling around Leonard’s name like a lover’s caress. Giorgio starts and lowers his head deferentially to the floor and Leonard diverts his attention to the Rossi patriarch.

Even though he is well on his way to 70, Giovanni Rossi is still an impressive man. He’s lost a little of the muscle he’d acquired as an enforcer for the previous head of the Rossi family and he’s never been overly large, but there’s always been something about him that has always loomed larger than life. The first time that Leonard had meet the man, Leonard had been eleven and trying to pretend that he was older, even though the whole of him had wanted to run and hide the moment that Rossi had breached the door of the apartment, flanked by four other men.

There’d been actual fear on Lewis Snart’s face that day. He’d cowered and wheedled and did everything that he swore he never did, promising Rossi that he’d hold up his end of the bargain and that, yes, the funds would be there and, no, the cops wouldn’t show. 

Leonard had been trapped in a corner of the room, too scared to run, sure that this lion of a man would eat him if Leonard brought attention to himself. Rossi, though, had noticed Leonard all on his own. He’d turned his head towards where Leonard stood frozen, pretending that he was merely part of the furniture, and then smiled. “That your boy?” Rossi had asked and Lewis had nodded, willing even then to throw Leonard under the bus as long as it saved his own skin.

“Must get his looks from his mother,” Rossi had remarked, a smirk pulling at his lips. At the time, Leonard hadn’t known what that meant, not really. His heart had been beating in his chest like a bass drum and as soon as Rossi had turned his head, Leonard had inched toward the hallway and then fled, running to hide Lisa before Rossi found her, too. He’d stuffed her in his underwear drawer, her little body fitting between his four pairs of socks and six pairs of underwear with room to spare as she continued to sleep peacefully, blissfully unaware of the monster prowling through their living room. 

They’d met again when Leonard was seventeen, running with Paravalli’s gang because he was offering the best cuts for nobodies fresh out of juvie and Leonard had needed the money. Mick had gotten him the job and had been standing beside him when Rossi had walked by, taking a tour of the warehouse. “Lewis Snart’s kid?” Rossi had stopped in front of him. “Leonard, right?” Leonard had nodded, slow and careful because though he didn’t want to advertise his connection to his loser father, it was never a good idea to lie to someone who knew the truth. “Let’s hope you do better than he did, huh?” His eyes had traveled down over Leonard and back up. Unlike the last time that they had met, Leonard now knew what he was seeing in Rossi’s eyes. He’d clenched his fist as his skin crawled. “Nice meeting you again.”

Mick had growled when Rossi had walked away. “I don’t like that guy.”

“Me either,” Leonard had agreed. They’d both quit a week later. 

From then on, their paths had crossed every now and then, though Leonard tried to ensure that it was always closer to never. Rossi, however, never seemed to mind. He openly admired Leonard’s work, provided that it didn’t get in his way, and had once let Leonard lay low in one of the apartments that he had scattered throughout the town, when Lewis had blown back into town like a hurricane.

A few years later, Rossi had left to establish ties in Gotham, leaving the Central City holdings to his oldest, Angelo. Leonard had known when he’d come back—there’d been a high society ball like Rossi wasn’t a criminal mastermind, attended by senators and all the glittering jewels Central had to offer—but for the most part, Leonard had managed to keep them out of each other’s way. It had helped that he’d graduated from Central City hoodlum to world class thief, giving him the world as his playground rather than Central’s familiar, well-traveled blocks.

“Care to tell me what you were doing in my vault?” Rossi asks.

Leonard shrugs casually and looks away, pretending that he’s interested in Rossi’s décor. “I was in the area,” he says. “Thought I’d stop by.”

Rossi chuckles, evidently finding Leonard’s deflection funny rather than annoying. “You should have called first. I would have had Georgina make dinner.”

“Wasn’t going to be that long of a visit.”

“I imagine not.” Rossi spreads his hands out over his desk. “I must admit, that this one was pretty sloppy, Leonard. Not up to your usual standard. Your tech, in particular.” Leonard couldn’t disagree with that one. Even with Rossi owning the vault, they would have been alright if Klein hadn’t bumbled the decryption and stumbled across the resultant laser grid.

“What can I say, good help is hard to find.” Leonard twirls his hands in his cuffs.

“You should watch your tone,” Giorgio growls. “Do you know who you’re talking to?”

“Do you?” Leonard replies and holds himself still when Giorgio lunges for him.

“Giorgio!” Rossi barks. “Is that any way to treat a guest?”

“You heard what he said—”

“Leave,” Rossi orders. “All of you.” He nods at the goons still standing at Leonard’s shoulders and points at the door. Giorgio glares at Leonard for a moment and then obeys, walking stiff-leggedly towards the door.

“That’s it,” Leonard calls after him, unable to resist the opportunity. “Run along.” The door slams shut.

“Where is Mick?” Rossi asks. Leonard doesn’t answer. Rossi knows damn well where Mick is these days—or rather where he isn’t. Rossi’s just jamming his thumb into a known wound. Leonard pretends that it doesn’t hurt, keeps himself expressionless, and Rossi clucks sympathetically. “Oh, that’s right. You two had a bit of a falling out, didn’t you? Last year, was it? Such a shame.” Leonard stays silent, turning his head to study the walls again as if Rossi bores him. “I heard he broke out of the ambulance. Nasty burns.” 

Screaming like a madman. The cops had thought that he’d been jacked up on PCP or some other drug. Leonard had read the police report.

The day ranks up there as one of Leonard’s worst and, with his shit life, that’s saying something.

Rossi comes out from around his desk to stand in front of Leonard. Leonard pretends that it doesn’t bother him, when they both know that for the lie it is. For a multitude of reasons, Leonard’s never liked people invading his space, and especially not when he’s bound. Rossi’s never cared, but, then again, he’s one of Leonard’s reasons. “So, you’re alone,” Rossi says, his voice hinting at all kinds of insinuations.

“Obviously not,” Leonard replies, dry as dust. “Or did you miss the fact that I only got caught because of my partners?”

Rossi smiles at him, liking Leonard’s sarcasm as he always has. “I mean you haven’t replaced Mick.” He leans back against the desk, his hands sliding along the polished wood. “Or do you want to pretend that either of those fools you were with were worth your time?”

Leonard doesn’t have a comeback for that. It’s true. Neither Stodge nor Klein are anywhere near the caliber that Leonard would like them to be. Stodge can’t take orders and Klein is far less an expert than he claims.

“And no one warming your bed?” Leonard doesn’t acknowledge the question. It isn’t any of Rossi’s business—has never been beyond a few moments in their shared history, all poorly thought out, and all given as part of services rendered than out of any real desire. 

Rossi’s smile grows as if Leonard had given him an answer that pleased him and perhaps Leonard has. “You could have asked, you know,” he says. Leonard cuts his eyes back over to Rossi, waiting for the man to finish his statement. “If you were down on your luck or in need of a job…” Rossi’s fingers tap along the edge of his desk. “In need of protection?”

“I just wanted the jewels,” Leonard replies flatly. Rossi might have more money than some countries, but Leonard’s not exactly down on his luck. The job had simply been a job, an excursion to keep his skills sharp, which he apparently needed to do more of if this was his result.

And Leonard certainly doesn’t need protection—not in the arms of someone like Rossi at any rate.

“You could have asked for those too. I’ve indulged you in the past.” Rossi’s smile turns devilish as he reaches out a hand and strokes his thumb down Leonard’s cheek. “I bet the blue would match your eyes.”

Leonard tosses his head away, refusing the touch and fights back a surge of revulsion, both for the man in front of him and himself. After all, Rossi might have been the one to make the offer but it was Leonard who had accepted. He could have walked away, but he hadn’t, too young and stupid and desperate to escape his father—to help Lisa escape their father. He pulls at his cuffs, dragging them against the thick wood of the chair. “Don’t touch me.”

Rossi shrugs and drops his hand back to his side. He crosses his arms in front of him. “Imagine what you could do if you had my resources backing you. The things you could accomplish. There’s nothing that could stop you.” It’s an offer that Rossi has made before and Leonard is even less tempted now then he was when he’d rejected it before.

“Yeah, I’m going to have to pass.” Again.

“You’re not as young as you once were,” Rossi says and he’s certainly one to talk. “You’ll grow old and then what will you do? When your body starts to betray you?”

Leonard twists his lips into a smirk. “Don’t think I’ll last that long.”

“Yes, you do.” Rossi shakes his head. “You’re too smart not to plan for that.” Rossi drops his eyes to the floor as silence settles between them, evidently deep in thought, and Leonard swallows back a kernel of fear. Rossi thinking is never a good thing, not for someone sitting opposite him.

Rossi lets him stew for awhile, wanting him to get worked up. It’s a tactic that had worked on Leonard’s father time and time again. Leonard refuses to let it get to him. His mind spins with the possibilities, but he doesn’t let himself indulge, keeping himself removed before his cold exterior can crack.

Rossi’s hands snap forward, latching onto Leonard’s shoulders like twin vipers, fingers digging in, and Rossi’s there, directly in Leonard’s space, unmovable and unavoidable. Leonard punches down the fear, forces his features smooth again, and tries to relearn how to breathe. Rossi smirks. “There you are,” he whispers. “I knew you were still in there somewhere.” His hands trail up to wrap around Leonard’s neck, cupping his jaw and forcing his face upward. Still breathing heavier than he’d like, a glaze of panic settling along his nerves despite his best efforts, Leonard refuses to give Rossi the satisfaction of eye contact, dropping his gaze away. He knows what Rossi will find if he gets the chance to look and it’s not anything that Leonard wants the man to see. Rossi chuckles, knowing Leonard’s game.

“Thirty years, you’ve turned me down,” Rossi says quietly. “What am I supposed to do with that?” One of his fingers push against Leonard’s lower lip, pulling it down with a soft touch, and Leonard’s hands tighten into fists, aching to answer with violence. The cuffs rattle as Leonard pulls on them again.

Rossi kicks Leonard’s feet further apart and braces a knee against the chair between Leonard’s thighs. “And now I find you in my vault, trying to steal from me. Trying to _steal_ from _me_.” He shakes Leonard’s head as anger finally threads through his voice. “When did you ever get so careless? Decide that it was okay to disrespect me so blatantly?”

“I didn’t know it was yours,” Leonard whispers honestly. His lies, his stories, his cons, they won’t get him out of this. He doubts the truth will either, but it’s all he has. He lifts his eyes to finally meet Rossi’s. Perhaps he shouldn’t, but if Leonard’s death is coming, then he wants to face it. “I wouldn’t have touched it if I had known.”

“You expect me to believe that?” Rossi hisses. His grip shifts downward to fully grip Leonard’s neck, tightening. Leonard gasps at the air, pulling in a few last breaths before Rossi can cut him off entirely. “That you of all people decided not to cross a ‘t’? Dot an ‘i’?”

“It’s true.” Leonard chokes as Rossi tightens his grip around Leonard’s neck even more, strangling him, making it impossible to breath. Leonard wonders if this is it, if this is what his life comes down to—one botched job and an unmarked grave courtesy of Giovanni Rossi. An empty ending to an empty life.

“You are beautiful, aren’t you?” Rossi mutters, anger dropping away as suddenly as it had emerged. “Both you and your sister, heartbreakers.” He nods savagely. “You get it from your mother, because your father’s a piece of shit.” He finally releases Leonard and steps back, flexing his hands as if nearly killing Leonard had taxed them. It might have. Leonard sucks in desperately needed air, leaning forward as he pants. “You’re off your game, Leonard,” Rossi says. “You have been for awhile.”

Leonard nods once in acknowledgement. Another time, another place, he’d deny it, but it’s true and he knows it. He’s been off his game since that last job with Mick, his confidence burned away in the fire that had nearly claimed Mick’s life.

“Go find Mick.” Leonard snaps his attention back to Rossi, his brows drawing downward. “Tell him you’re sorry, get down on your knees for him, whatever you do.” Rossi studies him, eyes narrowed. “Because this? This isn’t you. Right now, you’re no better than your looks, and you know that those only get you so far.”

Rossi leans back into Leonard’s space again, catches Leonard’s head when Leonard tries to tilt it away and kisses him, a soft press of his lips. Leonard jerks backward, his wrists rattling the cuffs, and the chair moving with him, but Rossi follows him the inch that he gains, not allowing him the space that he needs. A tremble ripples along Leonard’s body and he clenches his fists to fight for the ice he can usually surround himself with. It comes hard, slow as a glacier and only partial. Bound with Rossi’s hands on him, it’s the best that he can manage.

Rossi pulls back, releasing him and smiles as Leonard stares warily, waiting for Rossi’s next move. “Go find Mick,” Rossi repeats. “You’re no fun like this.” Behind Leonard, the door to Rossi’s office opens and the goons from before stomp back in, standing to either side of Leonard. “Take him to the gate,” Rossi tells them. As the men unsnap Leonard’s cuffs, Rossi looks back down at Leonard. “Don’t you ever let me catch you in one of my vaults again.” Rubbing his wrists, Leonard nods in understanding. He can do that. In fact, he thinks he’s going to take a vacation for awhile, head somewhere that he knows Rossi isn’t. “Well, unless I invite you and you want to try those sapphires on for me.” Leonard freezes, flicking his gaze back over to Rossi with a glower, and Rossi chuckles. “Giorgio will see you out.”

“Me?” Giorgio asks, his sneer fading into confusion. “But—”

“ _Safely_ to the gate,” Rossi interrupts. He glances between his son and Leonard and smiles. “And keep your hands to yourself.”

Giorgio’s face slides into an angry frown. “Yes, sir,” he replies, because stupid or not, even he knows not to refuse a direct order from his father.

The hired muscle pull Leonard to his feet as Rossi heads back around his desk. “And Leonard,” Rossi says, “don’t forget what I said.”

“Got it,” Leonard replies, expression back to the cool calm that he prefers. He turns and heads out the door, leaving Rossi’s henchmen having to lurch forward to catch-up. Leonard wants out of the mansion as in yesterday.

“Until next time,” Rossi calls after him. Leonard ignores him. If Leonard has his way, there is never going to be a next time—with the possible exception of the man’s funeral. He’s going to try not to be so stupid in the future. First, though, he needs to go find his former partners, make sure that the loose ends are taken care of.

And maybe he will go get Mick. Sometime. After they’ve had a bit more time to cool down.

Mick’s always been the best for him, crazed pyromania, poor impulse control and all, and Leonard’s always been the best for Mick. They’ve worked well together for thirty years and as much as Leonard hates to give Giovanni Rossi anything, the man had been right. Leonard has been off his game.

It’s just been so long since there’s been anything worth raising the bar for. Rossi had said that Leonard was no longer any fun. Leonard thinks that Rossi might have been on to something because if Leonard allows himself to think about it, classify it, he would say that over the past few months, he’s felt _bored_. There’s nothing interesting anymore, nothing that makes him step up his game, nothing worth fighting or fighting for.

Maybe that will change.


End file.
